One evening not long ago, at about the time I started thinking about how to write a profile on Jackie Duffin, I was half-listening to As It Happens on the car radio. The perplexing issue of widespread and persistent drug shortages in major Canadian healthcare establishments was in the news, and the host called up the leading expert on the topic, the sponsor of a site that tracks drug shortages in Canadian healthcare establishments, Hannah Chair in the History of Medicine at Queen’s University … Jacalyn Duffin!

The Canadian Society for the History of Medicine knows how to honour those who made it. The annual keynote lecture is named for G. R. “Pat” Paterson, a very important figure in the history of the society. Paterson was a pharmacist, a historian of pharmacy and the first executive director of the Hannah Institute for the History of Medicine.

Humanities and social sciences scholars in Canada at all levels of research benefit from the support of the predominant Canadian federal funding agency, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council …

To nominate a candidate for Canada’s Greatest Healer, Tweet with the hashtag #CanadasGreatestHealer. While you’re at it you can follow @CanuckHM here. Nominations can be as long and multiple as anyone wishes, though nominations that restrict themselves to 140 characters are encouraged.

While the biological process of birth is largely static, childbirth is a socially mitigated event, which is shaped by trends in different cultures at various times. The social investment in childbirth is evident in the recent news coverage of Princess Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, and the birth of her second child, Princess Charlotte Elizabeth Diana, included speculation about her use of pain relief, scrutiny of her appearance, and criticism of her swift departure from the hospital.

Montreal is a city with a singular history of health activism — one that, on closer consideration, has a distinct anti-fascist and humanist character. I’m reminded of this when I come out of Guy-Concordia metro station and run smack into the statue of Norman Bethune.